It hasn’t even been a year since Jay Leno left The Tonight Show, relinquishing the reigns to Jimmy Fallon, yet Leno has plans to return to the show on Friday, Nov. 7. Shockingly, Leno has not been on the show since his departure, although he made a small appearance in Fallon’s hilarious House of Cue Cards sketches. About a month ago, it was announced that Leno would be returning to television in a CNBC show about cars. But now that Leno will be returning to his old stomping grounds — technically his east coast stomping grounds, as Leno’s show was out of Los Angeles — does Jimmy plan to give up the power to his predecessor?
Back in February, Fallon invited Leno back to the show to be a guest, even telling Today “I told Jay, I gave him a round-trip ticket to New York... the stage is his, so whenever he wants, he’s got a stage.” That’s a lofty promise for Fallon, to give over his entire show to Leno upon his return. So is that what is going to happen on Friday? Well, the announcement states that Leno will be a guest on the show, but that doesn’t mean that he and Fallon don’t have something up their sleeves.
Here’s why Fallon should let Leno take the stage: he promised! While it wouldn’t be weird to have Leno seated on the guest side of the desk, it would seem a little bizarre to tell people that you would let Leno have the stage, only to allow him a five-minute segment as a guest. Luckily, Fallon is definitely a man of his word, and has never been one to be full of himself, so allowing Leno to have a hand in Friday’s show seems totally possible.
Another reason Fallon should let Leno take to the stage? They will absolutely come up with some genius presentation of welcoming Leno back to the show. They are both comedy geniuses, and with Fallon’s ability to try new things on the show, there is no doubt that the two will become a force of late-night nature.
The only reason I would be against Leno taking over the show on Friday would be that we wouldn’t get Fallon’s face on our TV screen for an hour in its full entirety. Also, would Leno do the entire show, as Fallon does it? Would he do Friday “Thank You” notes, because that would be hilarious if they did a hybrid of the new Tonight Show and the old Tonight Show.
We'll find out soon what Fallon and Co. plans to do with Leno's arrival to New York, but until then, let's remember this.
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